


Soon

by LeastExpected_Archivist



Category: The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Character Death, F/M, Interspecies, M/M, Points of View
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2002-02-04
Updated: 2002-02-04
Packaged: 2021-03-07 03:20:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,290
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26280082
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LeastExpected_Archivist/pseuds/LeastExpected_Archivist
Summary: by Lady IriaLegolas looks forward to crossing over the sea and muses backwards over lost loves.
Kudos: 2
Collections: Least Expected





	Soon

**Author's Note:**

> Note from Amy Fortuna, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Least Expected](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Least_Expected), which has been offline since 2002. To preserve the archive, I began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in August 2017. I e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on the [Least Expected collection profile](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/leastexpected/profile).
> 
> Disclaimer: I own zilch, so even if I was sued, there'd be nothing to take.  
> Feedback: uh huh!  
> Story Notes: Short excerpt from a piece that I'm in the process of writing. Part of WAY longer Legolas-fic with original characters. Don't ask.

My heart yearns for you beloved. Long years have passed since you departed over the sea, longer they seem since I have not held you in my arms. Why is this the fate of the elves? Could you not ask your kin to relieve our suffering? For I hold within my heart the pain of the firstborn, the pain of parting, of fading.

Lately it has been even more unbearable. Oh beloved, if you were to see how I am deprived of my loves, one by one. The forests have long since ceased to enthral me. Gimli hides in his caves of crystal, sleeping with the hair of Galadriel by his side always. He rarely comes to the city now, not even to visit. And Aragorn. Oh _tinu melui_ , if you could only see how he ages, how he who we watched grow into manhood now begins to wither and grow cold. It would tear your heart, even as it rends mine.

How many years has it been, beloved? Many since we three were beneath the trees together. Oh the memory! The thought of your skin beneath my hands, your lips upon mine, the desire of two boys for one of the Ainur. The sweetness of those times! I can never forget, nor put it aside. You are burned in my mind my love, even as the picture of Aragorn before my eyes passes away into ageing shadow.

Each detail is branded in my brain. Even as I look upon the man now I remember. You told me that this would ease the long years of our separation, yet it only gives me more pain. How could the memory of that do this? That day and night that the two of us were still so young, he barely a man and I still a child when compared to you. That day seemed to me to be the most cherished memory that I would ever hold. You and I, almost two thousand years we had already between us, a simple matter it seemed to instruct a boy in our ways. But, in intending to give me a substitute for your love, you gave me instead a painful reminder of your absence.

He knew. As we enjoyed each other's company in Ithilien, he knew. Even as the love he gave me was only a shadow of the devotion he felt for his wife, so my desire for him was only a shadow of what I felt for you. It makes me wonder, wonder why he ever came to me at all. He must love you still, even more than he loves Arwen. Days and nights of passion built on this, was that meant to ease my pain? It never did, _melethril_ , for I would think of you endlessly, even as we coupled in my house.

The scent of you still lingers with me. Its phantom touch comes to me in my dreams. That is why I brought the King to my bed, so that I might taste of you again, even if the flavour might be dimmed by the passing of years. In his hands I can imagine that you hold me again, in his skin I can remember the taste of fruit of the Two Trees upon your skin. For the taste of you, the smell of you, it will not fade from those whom you have lain with, not until they have faded and left their bodies behind, and even then part of their spirit still remembers the touch of you. Such is the legacy of a Maia that is left to her lovers. The Blessed Realm before the darkness.

I have tried to capture your scent, the trees in my garden stand testament to that failure. The smell of the Blessed Lands, feebly mimicked by trees bearing fruit. Men have praised it, but they do not know what a weak shadow tortures my heart. Even Aragorn and Arwen cannot distinguish. Only Gimli knows, only he knows what torture all of this is to me. He watched us once, loving the way that we were joined so completely. Loving how he was yet part of our love. He has tried to capture it in stone, in sculpture of lovers, but he cannot. You haunt him too, and what you prophesied has come true, we love each other so dearly that it hurts my heart. He is the only true comfort I find because of what he knows. He knows that every where I turn, you are there. You eyes, your voice, your mouth on mine, your lips on me, the feel of your body joined to mine in thrusts of desire. Cries given together into the night. He does not seek to replace you, or to make me forget you, nor does he care when I call your name in passion. No, he understands it, and comforts me when I cannot forget.

Must I leave him? His love is not strong enough to keep me here. Not alone. Until now the combined love of Aragorn and friend-Gimli have kept me here, but Aragorn is soon passing, nay, he is almost already gone. Many months have passed since he came riding to my house. Months, or has it been years? Surely it has not been that long. Yet now he sits in his halls, turning grey as the stones. I almost think that he is the dwarf and not Gimli. Soon he will leave Middle-Earth, and so will I.

Yet Gimli will journey with me, if you will let him pass. We spoke of it once before, how I wish not to leave him and how he hopes to see Galadriel again before he dies. And yet, I do not tell him that if he comes with me, comes with me and if we live as we three lived for such a short time, that Mandos himself would yield to you and allow him to yet remain with us. I can only imagine it now, our lives in bliss, forevermore. Would you ask that for me?

It is already too late for Estel. Even the memory of nights beneath the forest boughs, you held in my arms, he cradled in yours, all three joined in line, even that cannot hide from me the truth. He goes now to die, our final kisses desperate and knowing. It is a clean passing, or so he says. Arwen is full of grief, both her own, and mine. She has always thought that there was more between her husband and I than there truly was and I regret not telling her the truth. I know that even now, as they walk towards the Houses of the Dead, she hopes to ask him to stay, to remain with us, for we are still young and still love life. Her choice is different from mine. She has known true love's bliss for fifty years. Not dreams and longing filled touch.

Soon, Anirael-nin, star of my desire, soon I will set sail. The ship is almost built, my course already set. The call of the sea is in my veins, the call of you within my heart. That will guide me to Aman, where so many men have failed to reach the Blessed Lands. I will not fade, never to see you again. I will come to you and rejoice in your love once more. Soon I will feel your body move with mine in our dance of love. I have not forgotten, I like to think that I remember every detail. Each place where your cries would be strongest, each touch that you love the most. All these I remember now, and soon will know once more.

* * *


End file.
